You almost heard me, and I almost saw you, but then the fog rolled in. Mr. Obama is a bad person, but I do not hate him. I simply detest the 'hope' he inspires in good (and not so good) people knowing that he is not going to change anything.

You claim he is your messiah, and that he has inspired you to be your own messiah, and I am supposed to--in a democracy--take this statement and do what with it. I am not trying to diminish you in any way, but dang it what the heck are you talking about.

You take every excellent point I make about him and turn it around and say he inspires you. WHY? Because he talks about change and wants to get rid of old policies that do not work. Hitler talked about changing the world too, and inspired a country to exterminate jews, gypsies, and homosexuals. Speaking inspirationally is a fine thing, but it is a fiction until you turn those words into action OR you can refer to the past as a predictor of the truth of those words.

You claim I am old school, and this is partly true. I believe in the golden rule, I believe in truth and justice, and I believe in the power of love. I have spent all 35 years of my life helping people and animals, and most of the time I have risked my life doing so. I consider myself a radical progressive, because I want change immediately. I have always been in trouble with the establishment, from grade school up until this present day, because I want to make the world a better place. Most of my friends are cast-offs, most of them people of color, and most of them poor because this is who I work with. I come from money, and could have had anything I wanted in this life, except the one thing I want--which is a day that no child or animal suffers. I did very well in school, and was offered a job the first time I argued a case in front of a judge--which was the last day of finals my first semester in law school (which means that I had not slept in about 2 weeks). I have made mistakes over the years--who among us has not--but my strong ethical code and belief system has goverened my actions and I am proud to say that if you knew me I would not have to verbalize who I am because you would already know.

Mr. Obama's words and actions are not representative of each other though, and it is this inherent contradiction -- between what he says and what he does or has done and thus might do -- that I find so disturbing that I would vote for anyone other than him. For example, he claims to be for unity but belongs to an extremely racist and separatist church, and when questioned about his allegiance to his mentor--Rev. Wright--he stated that he disagreed with the racist and illogical statments that this man has made. Unlike the Obamas, I could not have remained a member of Trinity church, and I would not have been able to have this man as my mentor because I do believe in unity, abhor ignorance, and thus abhor racism. Michelle Obama wrote her senior thesis on why blacks and whites should never live together, but you expect me to accept that it is a simple coincidence that he and Michelle belong to one of the most racist and separatist churches in Illinois, if not the country. Even is you give him the farthest stretch of the rope, the fact that his church then gave Mr. Louis Farrakhan a 'humitarian' award 5 months ago cements in my mind that this is not a coincidence. Actions speak louder than words, and unity cannot be the mainstay of your platform for president if you attendy Trinity church and hold Rev. Wright as your mentor unless you are a lying hypocrite.

I can parallel the racist/separatist issue with many other important issues (Iraq war funding, welfare, capital gains tax questions, etc., etc) but for me the discussion is already over. I truly think that elitism is the root of all evil, and racism is just one form of elitism. If you think that you are better than someone else simply because of an accident of birth this sense of entitlement will justify almost any behavior (from Rev. Wright to Hitler). All issues pale in comparison to this simple statement: if you are a racist/separatist you cannot be president of the USA. Messiah or not, he is a racist and he is a liar, and I won't cast my vote for this person. Hillary Clinton has always been a radical progressive--she has fought for poor people, people of color, the disabled, and the aged LONG before it was PC to do so. She is the truest example of forward thinking and change in the old way of doing things I can find out there and I hope for all of us that she becomes our next president. I hope this for you and me, AJ. For you and me.